Adrian's impossible choice
There were no windows in the war room. Adrian liked it that way.
Windows invited distraction—false comfort in city lights, the illusion of distance from consequence. In here, there was nothing to soften reality. Only steel walls, a glass-topped table cold beneath his palms, and a constellation of screens that mapped the truth with merciless precision. Data did not flinch. Data did not plead. Data did not betray you with tears or hope. It simply existed.
Tonight, even the data felt hostile.
Adrian stood at the center of the room, shoulders squared, hands braced on the table as though the weight of the city might collapse if he let go. A map glowed beneath his fingers in sterile blue. Streets, waterways, safe routes, dead zones—all meticulously rendered. Three
